Environment & Science

Downey hopes to highlight its role in space history

The wooden full-scale prototype of the space shuttle used at the Rockwell plant in Downey, beginning in 1972. From the 1960s to late '90s, the plant built components for space shuttles and capsules.
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A space suit designed and used by NASA for testing purposes is on permanent display at the Columbia Memorial Space Center, where the Rockwell plant once was.
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The cast of "Defying Gravity" practice the play's final scene during a rehearsal at the Columbia Memorial Space Center. The play tells the story of the 1986 Challenger shuttle disaster.
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Kerry Wieder, left, plays a character based on Columbia crew member Christa McAuliffe. Jaycee Cruz, right, of the Aerospace Legacy Foundation puts a watch on Wieder. The foundation provided the props and costumes for the play "Defying Gravity."
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Zach Johnson-Dunlop plays Columbia crew member C.B. Williams in the play "Defying Gravity." The play runs from Sept. 20 – 22 at the Columbia Memorial Space Center.
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The cast of "Defying Gravity" takes part in warm-up exercises before rehearsal.
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Actress Kerry Wieder puts on boots as part of her Columbia shuttle crew costume. The light blue suit is a close replica of what the crew wore.
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Apollo Boiler Plate 12 was used in a test mission in 1964 at the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico.
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Each time a shuttle crew returned to the Rockwell plant in Downey after a mission, crew members would sign a concrete slab. Discovery pilot Richard Covey and mission specialist George "Pinky" Nelson signed this slab after their mission in the fall of 1988.
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A replica of a mission control room at the Columbia Space Memorial Center can simulate a shuttle launch.
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Students have to solve problems to successfully complete their mission to the moon, Mars or Halley's Comet.
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Actresses Kerry Wieder, left, and Bianca Meiloaica embrace. Meiloaica plays Wieder's daughter in "Defying Gravity."
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Andrew Wahlquist founded the Downey Arts Coalition and co-directs the play "Defying Gravity."
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On the surface, Downey, California, looks like any other L.A. suburb. It has strip malls, wide streets and block after block of homes.

But from the early 1960s to the late '90s, Downey's Rockwell plant helped America explore space by designing and building lunar capsules and space shuttles.

The plant closed in 1999 and since then, much of that story has faded. But residents like Andrew Wahlquist hope to bring it back to the forefront.

"Downey's slogan has been 'Future Unlimited' because we always kind of held this idea that we reach for stars," he said. "So when we lost our plant, we kind of lost that larger goal."

Wahlquist founded the Downey Arts Coalition and this month, the organization is putting on a play called "Defying Gravity." It tells the story of the 1986 Challenger shuttle disaster.

Even though it's a sad story, Wahlquist says the city should take pride in the fact that that shuttle, and all other space shuttles, came from designs made in Downey.

At its peak, the city's Rockwell plant employed 30,000 workers. President Reagan and Queen Elizabeth both visited the sprawling 200 acre facility.

But few in Downey's younger generation know of the city's role in the space race.

"I just thought Downey was like a boring city," said 19-year-old Baselaya Martinez, hanging out at Downing Landing, a shopping mall built where the Rockwell plant once stood.

She says no one she knows talks about the "Space Age" history of her hometown, but once she heard about the important things that happened right where she was standing, she got really excited.

"That's crazy!" she laughed. "It's called 'Downey Landing' for a reason, I guess."

In addition to the mall, a science center also stands in the footprint where the Rockwell plant once was. It's called the Columbia Memorial Space Center and is dedicated to the memory of the crew of the Columbia Space Shuttle that perished in 2003.

Exhibits at the space center highlight many of those missions. Kids who visit can build robots, learn about gravity and operate a replica of a NASA mission control center.

The center opened in late 2009. It cost $10 million to build and requires more than $600,000 a year to operate. Guerra says the city made a choice to prioritize the center, even when it had to cut $11 million from its budget two years back.

Still, Downey doesn't yet have all the funds it needs to build a proper exhibit for the full-size space shuttle prototype it keeps in a tent across the street.

The wooden structure is dubbed Inspiration because it was the model that all space shuttles were based on. Rockwell built the prototype to win a contract from NASA in 1972.

"This is the first, the only one that exists," Guerra said.

Downey city officials are looking to raise $3 million to build a permanent home for the Inspiration.

That amount pales in comparison to the $200 million currently being raised by the California Science Center to house the Endeavour space shuttle. The flight-weathered craft has helped bring more than a million visitors to the Science Center, where it remains a blockbuster attraction.